I’ve always approached learning Linux by just diving into it and bashing my head against problems as they come until I either solve them or give up, the latter being the more common outcome.
I wouldn’t take this approach with other pieces of software though - I’d read guides, best practices, have someone recommend me good utility tools or extensions to install, which shortcuts to use or what kind of file hierarchy to use, etc.
For example, for python I’d always recommend the “Automate the boring stuff with Python”, I remember learning most Java with that “Head first Java” book back in the days, c# has really good official guides for all concepts, libraries, patterns, etc.
So… lemme try that with Linux then! Are there any good resources, youtube videos, bloggers or any content creators, books that go explain everything important about linux to get it running in an optimal and efficient way that are fun and interesting to read? From things like how the file hierarchy works, what is /etc, how to install new programs with proper permissions, when to use sudo, what is a flatpak and why use it over something else, how to backup your system so you can easily reconstruct your setup in case you need to do an OS refresh, etc? All those things that people take for granted but are actually a huge obstacle course + minefield for beginners?
And more importantly, that it’s up to date with actually good advice?
How Linux Works might be what you’re looking for
Isn’t it too advanced? Seems like a good book but like the opposite of what I meant - I’m curious about beginner resources that will get people interested, knowledgeable and comfortable about using linux on a daily basis as much as they are with windows after decades of using it, not to turn them into a “superuser familiar with internals like kernel, networking, LVM”.
The thing is, the day to day is mostly your distro. There are several that hide most stuff away and just work, but a resource would need to be distro specific, and the ones you’d want for a beginner are pretty straightforward. They’re a start menu and an app store that work pretty much how you expect.
The hang-up is mostly “I need word” and being confused by a different document editor, or things like that, and the fact that a lot of open source alternatives to popular applications don’t have as much work done on casual friendly UX. So maybe you’d want something like “alternative to” and guides to basic usage of common replacement apps?
Most anything past that is how the OS works.
Isn’t there a lot of overlap though, at least between OSes that are of the same type (like debian/ubuntu)? How to set up users, knowing that you need to manually configure automatic mounting of your drives, knowing how/when to use flatpak or apt or .deb, where to install apps… These are not really intuitive things, especially for someone coming from windows, and most “how to install linux” guides don’t really go into these in any meaningful way.
For instance at first I thought I could just keep a list of apt commands and make an “easy to reinstall” linux script at one time, and that lasted for whole of 10 minutes before I realized every app needs manual intervention in one or another way, or has a different way of installing. Also, as many people I just prefix everything with sudo to get it to install, but who knows if that is the correct thing to do? not me at least
There is and there isn’t.
Some things are pretty standardized. Users and groups, permissions, systemd (usually), a lot of the underlying architecture is pretty much the same everywhere.
A lot is very much not standardized. Booting, networking, desktop environments, what specific software is installed, the specific package manager in use, I could go on and on.
To learn the former, the book I recommend is the most accessible thing I’ve read. You don’t need to read everything, but portions were very helpful. To learn the latter, your distro will have the info you need, or should at least tell you what to look up elsewhere.
How do you mean? What kind of interventions?
This is just a consequence of trying to use messy flatpaks in addition to your distro’s native package manager. I get that people coming from Windows want to continue to do things the Windows way, but grabbing programs from the web is a bad habit on Linux.
This is generally correct for native package managers like apt. I would never trust installing anything foreign with elevated privileges. Rule of thumb for learners: Don’t run anything with sudo, and when you encounter commands that fail to proceed, investigate why. Only then, if it truly requires elevated privs, do you sudo.
Saving the “dot files”, directories in your ~/home whose names start with a period, will preserve configuration settings for pretty much all of your user-facing programs. Copy these directories back into a fresh install and you’ll find that there is little reconfiguration required. I personally do this with KDE-Marble, and it has been the same program, building upon the same map cache, since around 2017.
I’d say that the best learning resource you can have is a spare computer specifically dedicated to exploring Linux, with which you can install and break and configure and break again without worry. Learning Linux can be like playing a roguelite, and I mean that also in the sense that it can be fun.
I’m trying out popOS and even the native package manager (popOS shop?) installs most applications as flatpaks afaik? I have no idea where they end up being compared to windows’ program files or what kind of defaults they install with. I started putting my custom downloaded AppImages into the ~/Applications folder and then used AppImageLauncher to actually have them show up in search.
Then I will run into something like docker which is not in the shop and has a ton of commands you have to run in order to get it to work, like uninstalling conflicting packages, installing some certificates and keyrings and i dont even know what - it was supposed to work better than on windows but it is nowhere near as neat as there!
Then I install samba (again, not available in the popOS shop) and I have it running but i have no idea whether it’s set to automatically run or not. Searching for it with GUI tools doesn’t show it as installed anywhere so in this case i have to rely on the terminal. The popOS store does have a list of installed apps but the search field gets disabled when you go into this screen because it’s only used for browsing the shop, not through your installed apps?
This is what I do but the issue is that I have no feedback on whether Im doing the right thing or if im making the life unnecessarily difficult for me. Games will slap you and make you redo something if you fuck it up, linux just makes you live in agony until sometimes breaks and you dont know why.
Interesting. I did forget that there are some distros out there trying to shoehorn this as their official package distribution method.
*Passing this hot potato to the next commenter… the great outdoors is calling me.
Haha no worries, that’s also a common linux experience :P
I’d say that someone like you is more interested in using the command line to manage your package installations, so you can safely ignore the popshop as a convenience for others who are less interested in the details of their system
I want to use the terminal and I’d prefer the simplicity and reliability of a single command over various GUIs, but it doesn’t feel like it’s consistent or simple with the terminal either. For example with VSCode, it doesn’t have
apt-get install vscodecommand (at least not listed on its installation pages) - it recommends manually downloading the deb file and then apt installing it.https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/setup/linux
I just don’t know whats the proper / good way of doing it anymore. The popOS shop is horrible, you cant stop running installations cuz it freezes and stops giving any feedback, sometimes it breaks and doesn’t open fully, the UX is bad, but i dont know what else to do. At least with the shop I have a clear list of installed apps and a place to uninstall them, if i do it with the terminal I have no idea where they end up living.
dpkg -lwill list all .deb packages installed on your system.